“Take and Eat: Becoming the Body of Christ”
On this holy night, we gather around a sacred table—a table that is not simply a ritual to remember, but a living encounter with the Holy in our midst.
We remember a body.
A body given freely.
A body broken open in love.
Jesus does not offer a theological explanation.
He offers himself.
“Take and eat. This is my body.”
This is not a reward for the worthy.
It is not a boundary for the pure.
It is a gift—freely given—before betrayal, before denial, before the cross.
As Elizabeth A. Johnson reminds us, the incarnation reveals a God who chooses flesh as the dwelling place of divine life. God is not distant or abstract. God is present—in our bodies, in our stories, in our lives.
And so, Eucharist flows from this profound truth:
matter matters. bodies matter. our lives matter to God.
Jesus takes bread—ordinary, daily, shared—and blesses it.
Not by removing it from the world, but by revealing what it already is:
Holy.
Graced.
Alive with divine presence.
When Jesus says, “This is my body,”
he is not only speaking about himself.
He is proclaiming God’s deep “yes” to all embodied life.
And yet, for too long, Eucharist has been used as a line of exclusion—
deciding who is worthy, who belongs, who may come forward, and who must stay back.
But that is not the table of Jesus.
Jesus does not police the table.
He feeds those who will fail him.
He shares bread with those who do not yet understand.
He offers himself without preconditions.
And so tonight, we dare to hear these words in a deeper way:
“This is my body.”
This is your body.
This is every body.
The bodies of women whose calls have been denied.
The bodies of LGBTQ+ persons longing for sacramental belonging.
The bodies of immigrants, the poor, the excluded, the wounded, and the weary.
Each one—each beloved person—is a living sacrament of God’s presence.
Drawing on the vision of Ilia Delio, we can say that Christ is not confined to bread and wine. Christ is dynamically present—emerging wherever love is embodied, wherever justice is lived, wherever compassion takes flesh.
Holy Thursday gives us not one, but two sacred actions:
The breaking of bread.
And the washing of feet.
The table and the floor belong together.
We cannot receive the Body of Christ
and ignore the bodies of Christ in our midst.
We cannot say “Amen” at the table
and deny dignity in our lives.
To receive Eucharist is to become Eucharist.
To eat this bread is to say yes to being broken open for the healing of the world.
To drink this cup is to say yes to pouring out our lives in love.
This is our call as a community of disciples—
a community of equals—
a community where all are welcome at the table.
This night leads us toward the cross, yes.
But it begins with abundance.
Before betrayal—there is communion.
Before suffering—there is shared bread.
Before silence—there is love embodied in touch.
Jesus does not ask us to understand everything.
He asks us to trust love.
“Take and eat.”
Take belonging.
Take healing.
Take courage.
Take responsibility for one another.
And as we leave this table tonight, let us remember:
Eucharist does not end when the bread is gone.
It continues—
wherever bodies are honored,
where justice is practiced,
where love is made flesh again.
This is Christ’s body.
This is our body.
This is every body
Given for the life of the world.
Amen.
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